Image: Karolina Krasuska For a while in my journalistic career, I was the rock reporter with a weekly column which had the awful title of Pop People.
I have toyed with writing some memoirs of that time, probably called Notes from a Nobody in 1970s Australian Rock and Roll.
I mention the column as it was in the days before photos of journalists routinely appeared over or beside their writing. It was the byline we longed for. I had that, at least.
Pictures of hacks started to appear at The Sun in Sydney with the return from America of the shy new editor, Derryn Hinch, who ensured his face appeared all over the paper, a bit like an earlier Evgeny Lebedev in London’s Evening Standard.
As a writer of poetry and prose I have not really needed a likeness on my books. Theatre programmes only wanted one sometimes. Actors must have their day.
The website is a different story, and I have been lucky to have Adey Grummet, my wife of almost forty years, who has somehow captured me on various occasions in a not zombie-like rictus that is my reaction to having a photo taken.
But I found myself being asked about a mugshot, which the publishers of my first poetry pamphlet required. Publication was something of a surprise but Peter Blee, the priest behind the Cuckmere Pilgrim Path for which I was inaugural Poet in Residence, thought a gathering of poems from the year would be a fitting end to my time there.
So it was I found myself thinking apart from the fabulous Adey Grummet, who could carry out this office?
Our village held a street party to coincide with the weekend of King Charles’s coronation. Photographer and local resident Karolina Krasuska took a number of candid shots on the day and two of those caught me in a way I recognised myself.
We set a date for an hour’s shoot as light faded in the churchyard and some great images emerged. Which is a testament to Karolina, who tends to eschew formal portraiture.
From the proofs emerged a number of images, one which will be on the back cover of the pamphlet, For The Journey. It can be seen here.
Another adorns this page, along with me striding through a field. That was by Adey, and it appears on the front of the book.
I will let you know how you can obtain it soon.
I have toyed with writing some memoirs of that time, probably called Notes from a Nobody in 1970s Australian Rock and Roll.
I mention the column as it was in the days before photos of journalists routinely appeared over or beside their writing. It was the byline we longed for. I had that, at least.
Pictures of hacks started to appear at The Sun in Sydney with the return from America of the shy new editor, Derryn Hinch, who ensured his face appeared all over the paper, a bit like an earlier Evgeny Lebedev in London’s Evening Standard.
As a writer of poetry and prose I have not really needed a likeness on my books. Theatre programmes only wanted one sometimes. Actors must have their day.
The website is a different story, and I have been lucky to have Adey Grummet, my wife of almost forty years, who has somehow captured me on various occasions in a not zombie-like rictus that is my reaction to having a photo taken.
But I found myself being asked about a mugshot, which the publishers of my first poetry pamphlet required. Publication was something of a surprise but Peter Blee, the priest behind the Cuckmere Pilgrim Path for which I was inaugural Poet in Residence, thought a gathering of poems from the year would be a fitting end to my time there.
So it was I found myself thinking apart from the fabulous Adey Grummet, who could carry out this office?
Our village held a street party to coincide with the weekend of King Charles’s coronation. Photographer and local resident Karolina Krasuska took a number of candid shots on the day and two of those caught me in a way I recognised myself.
We set a date for an hour’s shoot as light faded in the churchyard and some great images emerged. Which is a testament to Karolina, who tends to eschew formal portraiture.
From the proofs emerged a number of images, one which will be on the back cover of the pamphlet, For The Journey. It can be seen here.
Another adorns this page, along with me striding through a field. That was by Adey, and it appears on the front of the book.
I will let you know how you can obtain it soon.
Image courtesy of Adey Grummet
Image: Karolina Krasuska
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